Guilty Party
by HotPinkCoffee
Summary: Cassie reflects on what she did to Visser One in #30, and the conversation she had with Marco in #35. Jake/Cassie, one-shot.


**Guilty Party**

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"I am an effigy, a parody of who I appear to be." –Natalie Merchant, _Effigy_

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The sun was setting red by the time I got home. I could see it going down across the field behind my house. Somewhere out in the woods, Ax was feeding. Tobias was probably settling in for the night, finding a safe branch to hide from the owls. My parents were inside, watching television.

All told, it was a beautiful, peaceful night on a night when I wasn't exactly in the mood to appreciate beauty or tranquility.

I went inside to use the phone. My mom welcomed me back, and I responded with a hello that sounded more sullen than I intended. I instantly felt even guiltier, which surprised me, since I'd started off pretty guilty. I hadn't realized I had separate guilt meters for each person, and I was now maxing them all out. I felt exhausted.

I called Jake, ended up reaching his mom instead, told her I needed to ask Jake about a math assignment. Told her it was a long assignment, so I couldn't put it off until Sunday. More lies, more guilt eating away at my insides. Not a big deal, I told myself.

"Hey, Cassie."

"Hey, Jake. You have any time to help me with math and the horse-stalls?"

"Um, sure. Do we need to get the whole study group together?"

"I'd rather it was just you, really. It's not anything important, don't worry. I just, you know, have some things to talk about."

"Okay. I'll bike over there. See you in a bit."

"Thanks. See you soon."

I sat down on the couch, head in my hands, thinking about how ridiculous it was that I couldn't even ask to talk to Jake without it being some coded message. After a while, I went out to the barn. On the way out I gave my mom a hug, but just shrugged when she asked me if anything was wrong.

It was dark by the time Jake got to the barn. One of the lights in the barn was out, so I was sitting on a bale of hay near the doorway, under the solar-powered lanterns.

He parked his bike and leaned it against the wall. "Hey."

"Hey."

"Kinda cool, those new lights. The color, I mean. They sort of match the moon."

"Yeah. Self-sustaining, too."

He sat down on the bale of hay next to me. If I'd been feeling a bit chilly a minute before, I no longer did. "So, what's up?"

His voice was concerned. The guilt that had been held at bay by being with him came rushing back. I looked at my hands, at the pieces of hay on them.

"I went and talked to Marco."

"I thought you might."

I smiled. "You know us all pretty well. He doesn't think you know he blew another morph. I mean, he doesn't know I told you."

Jake sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Yeah, he needs to get that sorted out. That was too close last time. One time was too close."

For a moment we just sat there in silence. Mentally, I was kicking myself for bringing it up. Of course he was stressed out about it. I probably didn't need to remind him that one of his tiny army might not be fit to fight anymore. Or, sadly, how important that was.

But, of course, Jake knows me too well to not know when I'm putting off talking about something. Maybe he just knows how comforting it is to talk to him, or how comforting it used to be, at least. "But that's not what's bothering you, is it?"

It was my turn to sigh, this time. "I brought up the OK Corral. I just was trying to talk him through things and get some reaction, and I don't know, it just came out."

I remembered how, a few hours ago, a trembling Marco had yelled at me to shut up and gotten that unfocused look in his eyes, like he wasn't looking at the world around him but at some awful replay of the events on the cliff-top. Because of me. A single sentence out of my mouth could shake someone like that.

I'd tried to salvage the conversation, of course, but it was pointless. I'd wreaked my havoc. Made things worse. No healing touch for Cassie, not anymore.

"Jake, I don't think he knows."

"That you were the one who pushed her off the cliff?"

"Yeah. I mean, maybe he knows but he's putting the blame just on himself." _Instead of on me_, I thought.

Jake frowned a bit and stared up at some moths flying at the lanterns. The moths reminded me of the butterfly I'd been, after a really lucky gambit with a Controller. By all rights, the war should have ended then, with no happy conclusion for the human race. But I'd gotten lucky. Really lucky.

"Jake? Why do you all treat me like I'm so innocent? It wouldn't be like this if Rachel or Ax or Tobias or even you had, you know, pushed her."

"Cassie…" Jake leaned back against the barn wall. "Cassie, it's not like that. Marco set up the whole scheme. She was going to kill him and me both when you dove. You're not to blame."

"Yes I am!" I yelled, then looked around at the house to make sure my parents hadn't heard me inside. I lowered my voice to a whisper. "I had a choice whether to dive or not. I could have knocked her forward. I could have gone for the gun. But I just thought – God, I just thought – my first instinct was to kill, Jake. Kill my friend's mom. So I did."

"We don't know she's dead," Jake said quietly.

I threw a clump of hay onto the dirt. I was acting like a child, but I didn't care. "Why are you protecting me? Why are you all protecting me?"

Jake closed his eyes and exhaled audibly. When he opened them again, his gaze was resolute. Stern, even. Like a father reprimanding his daughter. "Cassie, if you go down, we're all going down. You're the last hope we have."

I stared back at him, dumbstruck. My bottom lip trembled. It struck me, then, what I was to him, to them. Not just a friend and a comrade, but the one playing the role of the pure, innocent soul. They'd rather get covered in blood than let a drop stain my hands. Even though I was just as filthy and vicious and guilty and made just as many mistakes as the rest of them.

I looked away.

Jake continued, "Cassie, I have make the deadly decisions every day. Rachel gets off on the violence. Tobias kills for breakfast and Marco pretty much just murdered his own mother, and Ax, well, Ax was raised a warrior. So for God's sake, please don't tell me to start thinking less of you too."

He'd never really spoken to me like that before. I didn't have a response. For several minutes, we just stared out at the stars. The barn was far enough away from the main suburbs that there wasn't much light pollution. Just twinkling stars and the moon and blue lights.

He moved his hand over mine. I took a deep breath, turned my hand over and held his.

"Or maybe I'm just protecting you because I like you," he said with a smile, and we sat for a little bit longer.

Finally, he let go of my hand and stood up. "Well, I, uh, guess you didn't really need me for math."

I shrugged and got up too. I picked some hay out of his hair – God knows how it got there. "Yeah. Guess not. But Jake?"

"Yeah?"

I bit my lip, then smiled. A genuine smile, not one of those sad, self-deprecating, guilty party smiles. "I do still need help with the stalls."


End file.
